Starting a fire requires three basic necessities: fuel, oxygen, and an ignition source. Fuel can include wood, gasoline, petroleum based materials, etc. The ignition source can include flint, flame, concentrated sunlight, etc. When starting a fire via primitive means, well known procedures are typically followed to increase the probability of a successful fire start. Typically, burn piles are created starting from very fine fuel (e.g., tinder) with progressively larger pieces of fuel (e.g., kindling) in order to allow the fire to grow at a controlled rate in order to have enough oxygen and burnable fuel.
It is well known that the best way to start a fire in a survival situation, especially in wet climates and/or inclement weather, is to find a dry flammable material (e.g., tinder and/or kindling) to act as a base layer for the fire. Finding material for the base layer is imperative to getting a fire started when man made materials are not available for use. Wood can be added to the base layer to build the fire after the base layer has been prepared. As can be appreciated, the layer of kindling material is more easily ignited than larger sticks and logs, which will eventually be burned. Once the kindling begins to burn, larger sticks and logs can be added to the fire.
Hand tools used to cut wood include, but are not limited to, axes, adzes, chainsaws, splitting mauls, and splitting wedges used with a sledge hammer. Each type of hand tool has features that are useful for certain purposes, but each hand tool also has certain limitations. For instance, each of the mentioned hand tools are not typically carried around when exploring the outdoors due to the size, weight, and shape or functionality of the aforementioned hand tools. Further, each of the mentioned tools has a specific purpose, none of which include making tinder or kindling to help start a fire. Even further, none of the mentioned tools are designed to make tinder or kindling from wood found in wet climates or in inclement weather conditions.
A small and portable device adapted to manufacture different sized fuel in wet climates is needed.